~~~ Ch. 30 - Cloudy, Black Sphere ~~~

Hanlay says this girl didn't have her trainer license. Wants the girl to get her Unova license. I can endorse and make sure she's ready, I've known Hanlay since I was in college, twenty years ago. So this lady walks in, she's twenty-nine, dressed in a toned down veridian-red geddup, typical archaeology nerd. I'm impressed she's chosen to go to college so late.

Forgive me for thinking a gal studying archaeology doesn't know her pokemon. She breezes the mastery and obedience tests, no issues. A mother-fucking meganium! I asked the girl if she wanted to try some harder challenges, and she and her meganium took them all, lickety-split.

After the Sinnoh nonsense and my matches with Lyra, I look the girl up. Yeah, she'll get her Unova license all right. It'll go great next to her Johto and Kanto hall of fame portraits, I'm sure. For the next couple days, I'm pretty sure my team and I will be having nightmares about her meganium. After a couple rounds, I asked if she's gonna make a bid for Unova champ. Deadass, "I'll think about it," she says!

Everything that's happened the last ten years does make me wonder, though. After all, she's done an excellent job keeping her face out of the public eye.

Reminds me of Alder.

Poor guy.

Poor girl.

— Lenora, Nacrene City Gym Leader

~~~

I clicked in the pleasure of my moment, conquering the “locked” door. Unfortunately, the door itself had other plans, its own metallic click resounding in my mind. Soaking in the daylight, I turned to the door. It stood, towering over me, probably three times my height.

I left Oust in there, alone.

Alone?

I took a breath.

The other swaddlies were still in the atrium, so it wasn’t as if the spawn was truly alone. Though, he was kind of stuck? No way to get down unless he bit off the silk and came down, or turned ghost. The three other swaddlies were already making their way to a perch on some trees, absorbing the light of the post-lunch, noon-day sun. Bonk was exploring the edge of the thick walls, sewing what I could only imagine were leaves. Tug stayed nearby.

I took another breath as I was inserting my blade-arm into the door, fiddling and trying to get my spear-blade to latch on. I shouldn’t have left the kid alone—what if the humans came back? I just—nope, not going to think about Oust being taken to the pokecenter without me. He was my responsibility! I could hear him chirping through the door.

I won’t let them have you! I’m coming! I thought at him, to no response. A wave over my vision, my head ached, my vision swam in light leaves.

You’re not alone. Tug’s scent had turned anxious. Oust cried again, light chirps. I pulled my arm out of the door. I looked around me, pink and black leaves slipping and sliding in my vision to the tune of light abdominal pulsing. A second later, a red, yellow and black snake phased into my thorax. I seized for a moment, tripping. Bonk and the other swadloon looked to me in concern before the little child reappeared, reforming in my arms as I sat on my ass in the outdoor dirt.

Holding the child, I clicked, ticking their reformed sewaddle body, feeling their uncertain scents rolling out. They squirmed under the tickle. Uncovered in my silk, they’d managed a clean escape from the swing I’d left them in. There was a thud, knocking me out of my focus on Oust. They were winding up again—throwing leaves at trees. I turned Oust out, to watch as Bonk launched another leaf. I saw the motion of the green through the air, embedding it in the dirt.

The kid watched them in silence. Tug waddled over, joining us. She was only a tad bit larger than Oust. Not as interested in their play-fighting, she didn’t seem to be growing in size very fast. Content to watch Bonk play, we soaked up the sun together, in silence, engaging and our scents eventually shifted into a mute, slightly anxious lavender.

More than four times my height, the walls surrounding us were a very thick, dense brick, and blocked out a surprising amount of the city's sounds which assaulted us on the street, casting long shadows where the sun was not overhead. Pockmarks from old fights lined the wall—they were built to take big hits. I didn't see any big pockmarks on the buildings around us.

You should climb it, I thought.

A couple more thumps, Bonk had flung more leaves at the nearby trees. Tug drew closer to Oust and me. I pulled her close, mashing the fake sewaddle and the swadloon together, both crying out in their own voices at the surprise, the two squirming playfully in my arms.

Maybe later tonight. I thought. Best not to meet police officers in the middle of the day again. I tapped the ends of my legs together.

Also, shoes.

Around our courtyard, the high-rise buildings seemed like the normal kind, various rays of glass reflecting down and giving us sunlight we would miss out on, were it not for the building's presence. If I was an office worker, I'd have jockeyed for anything that gave me a view of the courtyard.

Tug and Oust both stopped squirming, seemingly used to being in each other's faces. A slight anxious scent drifted from beyond the door, following inconsistent taps and chirps. The other swadloon had probably gotten bored and wanted out? No, I'd locked myself out. And they were worried? Not just that. The sky was turning dark. I'd fallen asleep and hadn't even noticed.

I set Oust down, walking back to the door, my abdomen humming as if in response to my own anxiety. I rubbed my blade-arms together. Had Lanky or Sundresser returned? Did they think we'd been stolen? I looked back at Oust and Tug as they both woke up and watched. I fiddled with the inner latch on the door again, Tug and Oust both drew, near, followed by the swaddlies.

Food is soon, I told myself. Have to beat Lanky and Sundresser back inside.

This mechanism was a lot more well-maintained? It was heavier, at least. I pulled in my arm, pulling my eye close, poking it lightly in. It pushed out into the yard. The curve of the latch would face into the atrium.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

That's what I've been doing! I clicked, annoyed. Bonk and the swaddlies all arrived. All the swaddlies on the inside joined in, trying to push on the door as I fished the latch. "Eeeaaa," I moaned quietly, my abdomen vibrating. As if the kid had heard my prayer, the door shimmered purple. I fell forward, catching my own stumble by the door of the gym. Lanky's smell, no—I looked up. Lanky was in front of me. The saline smell of physical activity mixed with a kind of sour, tense anxiety rolled off him in waves.

Oh no, was my first thought. Sundresser was in the room, walking through the door, holding bowls of food. After a quick pause, the scentless-cannot-compute kind, Lanky grabbed me, and pulled me to him? In his arms? Like a hug? Look, I'm not about to go running through the city in the middle of the day! He let me go, holding a hand over his heart.

He probably thought you were stolen. Right. The swaddles all ran past us, like a pack, to the bowls.

So, is he going to ignore the god-kid slowly waddling across the room, oooor? The answer to that question, once we'd gathered at our bowls of dinner fruits and veggies, was “no.” No, he was not about to ignore the god-kid that had sewaddled across the room. His persistent, though confused tones of mute and competing smell-tastes, while slow, were enough.

Everyone through, the portal through the door closed as Lanky picked me up in one arm, pulling out his pokedex. The screen went from a dark black, before booting up a minute later, turning on. He held it out, over Oust. What showed, after the scan, it…wasn't Oust. More like an empty screen, with a line to a yellow, red and black version of Oust. He set me down on the ground, staring at his screen for a moment.

That turned into short, high-pitched giggles, before growing louder, and more threatening. I moved next to Oust, pulling him close to me, as the laughing continued, shifting into heaves, wiping his eyes.

I… I rubbed my blades together, scooping some fruits and veggies, trying to eat. Lanky continued his laughing. The swadloons all turned. I spilled a carrot and some yams onto the floor. The laughing continued, and I scooped them all down, leaving only a couple of small pieces for poor Oust.

Lanky's laugh subsided after a couple minutes. He wiped some tears out, before actually-coughing. I picked the kid up, feeding him what I could. Sundresser-girl held her own tablet at Oust, scanning with her pokedex. She started short, soft mute giggles, picking up her bag and putting it into her face. Oust's smell-taste turned a putrescine-sour. I backed away. Lanky started giggling again, and then both were back into laughing, angry coughs mixed into it.

Oust in hand, abdomen vibrating in our mutual anxiety, I backed away from the source of the vibrations, off of the indoor dirt, passing through the wall, onto grass. The laugh turned to a shout. "Leah!" Lanky called, as Oust's portal closed. We were in a slight forest clearing, a red and green pokemon floating, watching us from a tree.

I held the kid up in my arms, staring at them, as our pheromones calmed our mutual escalation, replaced by the scent of dragons that I'd remembered from the other day. My abdomen vibrated. "Eee" I shouted, a psychic force hitting us, flinging me into the air, losing our tenuous grip on Oust. We were separated once more. My vision blanked, turning white from the immense pressure bearing down, holding me in place.

When my vision returned, a pitch-black latias, with stark pink highlights? Latias? breathing in my face, waves of pink and dark dripping down their body. My abdomen vibrated in paralyzing fear, all alarm bells going off at once, their mouth opening wider, then closing. They closed their mouth, sniffing me. Their own scent shifting soft from a tar-like hunger and anger to a more earthy one, apparently deciding that I wasn't good eating, I guess? They hovered, levitating around the area.

The area was marked, burns in the ground, trees torn, holes punctured through. This Latias was healing, from some kind of fight, but it was slow. Their scent moved to a mute kind of barky taste.

Latios and Latias' highlights are supposed to be blue and red. Thank you, inner dialogue. I couldn't tell.

I looked at them. I scanned for oust, who had, having reverted to their ghost form, taken to… lying down and playing dead. Well, they were clearly still pretty wounded.

Hello? Can you listen to me? I clicked as they circled me. The games always depicted the lats as smiling. But here it was closer to the small jaws of a predator that could smash you into the ground with sheer physical force.

They're lonely. That's why I'm not dead. I considered my options, exerting all of my strength to pick up a couple large blades of the tall grass, which I sewed together. They didn't seem to be psychic, at least in terms of their ability to communicate, nor were they looking at Oust like a meal.

So…friend?

Either that, or you're probably dead.

The simple necklace I made, covered in probably more silk than leaf. I clicked, holding it out for them, which they floated toward me, slipping on and accepting. Their pressure fully lifted, I walked once more. Picking up the shivering Oust, holding him close to me. The latias clicked, turning their head to the sky, two streaks of green and red circling. In a flash of black and pink, they were gone. The slightest vibration, with Oust in my arms, I dodged, just barely missing a claw that would have torn my arms off, instead being sent flying to the side, the leaf-dress protecting me from the worst of the glow.

Can we go?

I rolled, a missile from that same attacker flinging past me. Any place that wasn't here would do quite well. The answer to that question was "no," you don't get to just command the awesome godly powers that put you here. Instead, the answer to the "can we leave the fight" question was our new "friend," streaking across the forest, demolishing two ectoplasmic bodies to the ground. Our new latias friend turned their eyes to the blurs in the sky, which departed, seeing fit not to take us with it.

The dragons had had heads that looked like stealth bombers. Why would you fight a latias, even one that's alone? The latias zipped next to me, looked me in the eyes, then, blinked. Ten turned back, to me, holding an ice-cold, black sphere.

Don't think I'll be racing against y'all any time soon.

That was my thought, anyway, entirely missing any symbolic or intent behind the sphere that it had held and tried to offer us,

The iron and blood entered my antennae, the metallic smell overwhelming as latias' wounds rapidly healed. They grunted, in what I presumed was pain, opening and closing their mouth. A tear fell from their eyes, holding the sphere in their two hands, crushing it into pieces.

Oh, you poor thing.

You're trying to speak.

Welcome to the club?

I reached out, giving the girl a soft boop. Sorry gal, you have ten times my power. Uh, I could set her up with a professor? Maybe they'd have some kind of speech synthesizer thing hooked up for them? Aren't lats supposed to be super intelligent? I'm sure you could, like, figure out morse code at least. Sorry, this place is pretty dangerous and I'm sure you're a nice and misunderstood dark latias but uh Oust and I are just trying to stay alive and I'll take some social issues over battles between gods.

Gotta go back home, I thought at Oust, trying my best to articulate with smell the visuals of the backdoor area of the gym. How many ca—I thought, before the lat grabbed Oust and I, teleporting us to the exact middle of the gym, dropping us, and disappearing off on their own.

Wait, what? At least in the evening, a lot of people wouldn't see it? No, the door was open. Lanky, the Juniper girl, Aurea, Prof Juniper, sundresser, a guy dressed in all black, and an older lady in a research coat with blonde hair were all standing outside. The noises and tensions and smells of the city rolled back in, Lanky's own morbid anxiety rolling off him the first scent to hit.

The old professor fell over. Well, almost, their eggheaded psychic next to them caught them, holding them up. I looked down, Oust was already back in sewaddle form, looking up at me, hiding from the attention. Lanky ran towards me first, tears in his eyes again, for the second time today, hiccuping as he did, another round of relief. Oust wiggled in uncomfortableness at the hug, Lanky picking me up and carrying us over.

Eyes glanced between Oust and I.

I clicked in annoyance, rubbing my blades together, pulling the kid close. Scents said everything the silence didn't.

Jig's up.